Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys filed a brief Wednesday that responds to the Obama administration’s defense of its abortion pill mandate in one of two major legal challenges the U.S. Supreme Court will hear on March 25. Alliance Defending Freedom and allied attorneys represent the Hahns, a Pennsylvania Mennonite Christian family, and their woodworking business in one of those cases, Conestoga Wood Specialties v. Sebelius.

The mandate forces employers, regardless of their religious or moral convictions, to provide insurance coverage for abortion-inducing drugs, sterilization, and contraception under threat of heavy financial penalties if the mandate’s requirements aren’t met.

“In America, we tolerate a diversity of opinions and beliefs; we don’t try to separate what people do from what they believe,” said Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Counsel David Cortman. “The Constitution guarantees the highest form of respect to the Hahns’ freedom. The government must prove why disregarding that freedom is somehow justified.”

According to the Alliance Defending Freedom reply brief, “the government contends that [the Hahns] harm the ‘freedom’ of third parties simply by not buying them abortifacients…. But that turns ordinary notions of liberty upside down. Citizens are already free to buy birth control for themselves and the government often subsidizes those purchases. Yet in the government’s view that is not enough. For the government, coercion is the new ‘freedom.’”

“Americans must be free to exercise their constitutionally protected liberties without punishment,” added Alliance Defending Freedom Senior Legal Counsel Matt Bowman. “That at least includes freedom from government attempts to force them to pay for other people’s abortion pills.”

In January, numerous third parties filed briefs in both Conestoga Wood Specialties v. Sebelius and The Becket Fund’s Hobby Lobby Stores v. Sebelius case, which also challenges the mandate. The briefs filed in support of Conestoga Wood Specialties and Hobby Lobby outnumbered the briefs filed in favor of the Obama administration by nearly three to one.

The Hahns asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review their case after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 3rd Circuit ruled 2-1 against them. The decision conflicts with most other circuits and with the vast majority of rulings on the mandate so far. According to a dissent that Circuit Judge Kent Jordan wrote in that case, the mandate could cost the Hahns $95,000 per day if they don’t agree to live contrary to their Christian convictions.

Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys are lead counsel in the case together with co-counsel Randall Wenger of the Independence Law Center and Charles Proctor III of the Pennsylvania firm Proctor, Lindsay & Dixon. They are two of nearly 2,300 attorneys allied with Alliance Defending Freedom.

In Portland, Oregon, Melissa Klein was the owner of Sweet Cakes bakery, a small storefront operation. Her husband Aaron helped her. Last year two lesbians walked into the bakery and said they wanted Melissa to make them a wedding cake. The Kleins said they were sorry, but their Christian convictions were that marriage was between a man and a woman and they would not be able to make a cake for a same-sex ceremony.

Afterward, one of the women filed a complaint with the Oregon Bureau of Labor and Industries claiming she was a victim of discrimination. The same thing happened in Colorado to a Christian florist and in New Mexico with a Christian photographer. They refused to participate in gay or lesbian “weddings” and they were punished by their respective state governments. In Oregon, the bureau spokesperson said the Christian couple needed to be “rehabilitated.” They subsequently had to shut down the store.

Seeing this, some states, including Kansas, Arizona and Mississippi, have considered or are considering legislation to try to protect small business owners like the Kleins. Some in the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgendered movement (LGBT) want to force Christian business owners out of business.

However, at least one person in the LGBT community sees this for the slippery slope that it is. In a recent column, radio talk show host Tammy Bruce wrote:

As a gay conservative woman, I supported Arizona’s religious freedom bill, which was just vetoed this week by Gov. Jan Brewer…Under these rules, freedom of conscience is squashed under the jackboot of liberals, all in the Orwellian name of ‘equality and fairness.’ Here we are dealing with not just forcing someone to do something for you, but forcing them in the process to violate a sacrament of their faith as well…If we are able to coerce someone, via the threat of lawsuit and personal destruction, to provide a service, how is that not slavery? If we insist that you must violate your faith specifically in that slavish action how is that not abject tyranny?…Of all the people in the world who should understand the scourge of living under constant threat of losing life, liberty or the ability to make a living because of who you are, it’s gays.

Horribly, the gay civil rights movement has morphed into a Gay Gestapo. Its ranks will now do the punishing of those who dare to be different or dissent from the approved leftist dogma. To all the young gays who tweet and email me that this is about ‘equality,’ how exactly? Forcing someone to do something against their faith has nothing to do with equality for you, has nothing to do with bigotry and has everything to do with a personal, spiritual understanding of right and wrong. In other words, I tell them, not everything is about you…

This does beg the question about freedom of religion, freedom of association and what the government can compel its citizens to do. Should the government punish the Jewish photographer because he refuses to take pictures for a gathering of Skinheads? Should the government levy fines against an African-American printer who refuses to print posters for a Ku Klux Klan rally? Should a homosexual painter be forced to paint signs for the infamous Westboro Baptist Church in Topeka that reads “God Hates Fags!”

The answer is no to all of these.

The government should not compel an individual to engage in a business transaction that violates their conscience. The “Gay Gestapo” (of which not all gays and lesbians are a part) is now pushing well beyond “live and let live” territory into using the law to punitively enforce their political and social agenda.

Written by Tammy Bruce

Houses of worship now vulnerable to ‘Gay Gestapo’

As a gay conservative woman, I supported Arizona’s religious freedom bill, which was just vetoed this week by Gov. Jan Brewer.

I supported it because it embodied the values every American civil rights movement stood for: the freedom to live our lives without being punished for who we are.

In this case, it was a bill making sure people of faith would not be forced to violate their religious beliefs in the event someone demanded they do so.

This bill, like others across the country, was thought necessary because of the emergence of business, large and small, being attacked by the gay left for either espousing Christian values or acting on their Christian faith. Ranging from a bakery to a photographer, individuals were being sued for refusing to violate their religious beliefs.

Having been a liberal “community organizer” in my past, I immediately recognized the strategy being employed. This is an effort to condition the public into automatically equating faith with bigotry.

To make faith in the public square illegal and dangerous, you need legal cases and publicity. Voila, lawsuits against small business resting on the notion that acting on genuinely held faith is bigotry per se.

Under these rules, freedom of conscience is squashed under the jackboot of liberals, all in the Orwellian name of “equality and fairness.” Here we are dealing with not just forcing someone to do something for you, but forcing them in the process to violate a sacrament of their faith as well.

If we are able to coerce someone, via the threat of lawsuit and personal destruction, to provide a service, how is that not slavery? If we insist that you must violate your faith specifically in that slavish action, how is that not abject tyranny?

Of all the people in the world who should understand the scourge of living under constant threat of losing life, liberty or the ability to make a living because of who you are, it’s gays. It has been disgusting to watch supposed gay “leadership” drag young gays and lesbians through an indoctrination that insists that in order to have equality, you must force other people to do your will, make them betray who they are, and punish them if they offend you.

Horribly, the gay civil rights movement has morphed into a Gay Gestapo. Its ranks will now do the punishing of those who dare to be different or dissent from the approved leftist dogma. To all the young gays who tweet and email me that this is about “equality,” how exactly? Forcing someone to do something against their faith has nothing to do with equality for you, has nothing to do with bigotry and has everything to do with a personal, spiritual understanding of right and wrong. In other words, I tell them, not everything is about you.

This reaction to the Arizona bill surprised people, but it shouldn’t have. Keep in mind, the legal targeting of people of faith has been ongoing, with the Obama administration leading the charge. We see it in the Obamacare birth control mandate, which is also determined to force people of faith to abandon their belief under legal threat. The attack on Chick-fil-A because its CEO dared to espouse a faith-based view on gay marriage is another example of the attempt to intimidate people of faith.

That targeting of Chick-fil-A was a massive failure, which is why, I contend, the left shifted its focus to smaller, local businesses that could more easily be intimidated and threatened.

Why would the Gay Gestapo suddenly need to convince everyone that any act of faith must be viewed suspiciously as discrimination and “hate?” Forcing a bakery, Hobby Lobby, Chick-fil-A or a photographer to either violate their religious beliefs or be destroyed is simply a test run. The real target is the church and temple. If the left can convince our society to force people of faith to violate their sacraments in the name of “equality,” why would we allow that to stop at the church door?

This is why bills like Arizona’s protecting individual Christians from lawsuits will have to return, because the left has a mission, and this is only the beginning. It was clear Mrs. Brewer had no choice but to veto the bill, considering the left had completely smeared the state in the process of its media frenzy. Add to that the fact that liberals would like nothing better in this election year than to have this be the discussion in the media instead of Obamacare and the economy. Still, it will have to be confronted eventually if we are keep tyranny from eating away at the fabric of our culture.

Ultimately, the Arizona bill had nothing to do with gays and everything to do with protecting the right of individuals to live their lives in ways that may not include others, or may even offend certain groups. As Americans, we did not go through the growing pains of the civil rights movements only to capitulate to 21st century bullies who have the gall to use the importance of minority rights as a weapon to extinguish those with whom they disagree.

We can have both equality and religious freedom, but only if the bullies on the left are confronted about the truth of their agenda.

Tammy Bruce is a radio talk-show host, New York Times best-selling author and Fox News political contributor.

This article was originally posted on the WashingtonTimes.com website.

“Swallowing half an hour before closing time that second dose of soma had raised
a quite impenetrable wall between the actual universe and their minds”
(Aldous Huxley, Brave New World).

I’ll give it a go once more for the intellectually lazy and socially insulated “progressives” out there who, when discussing issues related to homosexuality, refuse to address questions regarding basic presuppositions and logical consequences. For example, Chicago Tribune columnist Rex Huppke just wrote a silly and condescending column in the Chicago Tribune about the serious issue of religious liberty in which he revealed his own ignorance of the topic.

“Progressives” like Huppke replace serious intellectual thought and rigor with ridicule and condescension in their quest to impose their homosexuality-affirming dogma on the entire country. Unfortunately in a country hypnotized by the digital soma that spews from Hollywood, this retreat from intellect works.

Huppke’s “argument” includes the following:

1.)  First, he trivializes the real concerns of conservative people of faith that they will be required to contribute to a same-sex “wedding” celebration. He trivializes this concern through exaggeration, saying that conservatives fear that homosexuals will “flock to bakeries run by people whose faith denounces gay marriage.” 

Well, he’s surely correct in saying that homosexuals won’t “always” seek the services of orthodox Christian, Jewish or Muslim business owners, but that’s hardly reassuring to those who have been, are currently, and will in the future be sued by those homosexuals who do intentionally seek those businesses out.

2.)  He trivializes the religious liberty component central to the debate by saying that though “Americans have many serious issues to worry about—unemployment, education…one issue rises above all others…gay wedding cake.” He further describes efforts to protect religious liberty as efforts to oppose the “menace of gay wedding cakes.” 

Perhaps Huppke and his ideological compeers aren’t aware that cultural change—including radical cultural change—rarely happens through a single cataclysmic event, but rather through the slow accretion of small events or seemingly trivial ideas that society ignores, accommodates, or embraces. Using the force of government to compel property owners to violate their faith in even seemingly small matters constitutes a significant erosion of religious liberty. 

3.)  Huppke mocks Christian beliefs about the nature of homosexuality through his neologism “gaynosity.” He explains that a number of states are considering “religious liberty laws that would allow bakers—or photographers, or florists, or, I suppose, plumbers—to deny service to gay couples if the business owner’s faith is compromised by the gay couple’s gaynosity.”He might be surprised to learn that many Christians do not believe that homosexuals choose their feelings. What they actually believe is that those who affirm a “gay identity” choose to place their unchosen feelings at the center of their identity and choose to act on them. So, while their feelings are not chosen, their (to use Huppke’s insulting term) “gaynosity” is. Where orthodox Christians most disagree with “progressives” is on the Left’s assumption that homosexual acts are morally neutral or morally good—which, of course, is not a fact.

4.) Huppke and virtually every other “progressive” trot out that bedraggled, old false analogy which holds that homosexuality is analogous to African American descent, comparing the efforts of Blacks to gain access to government schools and restaurants to homosexuals forcing businesses to provide their goods and services for an event that violates their religious convictions.

Homosexuality per se has no points of correspondence to skin color, but Huppke never addresses that pesky little fact. And Christian business owners are not refusing to serve homosexuals. They’re refusing to use their labors in the service of a ceremony that the God they serve abhors. But Huppke doesn’t address that pesky fact either.  

5.)  Then Huppke goes off the humor rails in a juvenile faux-interview with well-known Illinois  homosexual activist Rick Garcia, asking him inane questions that mock what the socially insulated, intellectually lazy “progressives” assume orthodox Christians believe: 

• “Rick…are you still gay?
• “Did you find that [eating a gay wedding] cake made you more gay?”
• “Do you believe gay wedding cakes can turn people gay?”
• “What is it about wedding cakes baked by gay marriage opponents that makes (sic) them so irresistible to gay people? Does the sinfulness of the occasion enhance the taste of the cake?”

6.)  Huppke thinks he has discovered a heretofore hidden conservative inconsistency. He argues that the claim of Christian bakers that using their labors in the service of a homosexual “wedding” means they’re “complicit in a gay marriage” is at odds with the claim of gun manufacturers who argue that their sale of a gun to someone who later commits a crime does not make them complicit in the crime. But selling a legal product to someone who without the gun manufacturer’s (or seller’s) knowledge intends to use it for an immoral act is patently not analogous to creating and selling a product with the certain knowledge that it will be used exclusively for an immoral act. There is no other purpose for the wedding cake other than the non-marital, faux-wedding, which is the immoral act. 

What else should business owners be compelled by the government to do in violation of their consciences—and remember, Christian bakers, florists, and photographers are not refusing to sell their products to homosexuals. They’re refusing to sell their products for a particular event:

• Should a male Muslim photographer who would be willing to photograph the pre-wedding preparations of groomsmen be compelled also to photograph the pre-wedding preparations of the bridal party, which would entail violating his religious beliefs about interactions with women?
• Should a Catholic photographer be compelled to photograph the annual Easter “Hunky Jesus” contest  (WARNING: SOME EXPLICIT PHOTOS) in San Francisco, which is hosted by the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, a group of “cross-dressing nuns,” and starts with an Easter egg hunt for children?
• Should an Evangelical Christian be compelled to photograph a commitment ceremony for five polyamorists, two males, two females and one genderless (aka “neutrois”)?
• If Kermit Gosnell had sought to hire a cleaning service owned by a pro-life Christian to clean aborted baby parts out of his refrigerator, should she be prohibited from refusing?

Some may raise objections to these questions, arguing that they don’t illustrate discrimination based on “sexual orientation.” First, I would once again remind them that Christian business owners are not refusing to serve homosexuals. Christian business owners are refusing to use their services for particular kinds of events. They’re perfectly willing to sell cakes and flowers to homosexuals—whose orientation they have no way of knowing anyway. Second, just wait a few years; polyamorists are going to be clamoring for their right to have their sexual desires and volitional sexual acts identified as a “sexual orientation.”

This type of objection should raise the more important question: Is “sexual orientation” a valid protected category?  No, it’s not. Historically protected categories were constituted by objective, morally neutral conditions like biological sex, race and ethnicity, and nationality. Homosexuality, in contrast, is constituted solely by subjective feelings and volitional acts on which there is no moral consensus. If “progressives” had any real interest in consistency, they would insist on protecting all members of groups that are constituted by subjective feelings and morally dubious volitional acts. This would mean adding all paraphilias to our anti-discrimination policies and laws. Logical consistency would demand that sadists, masochists, minor-attracted persons (MAPS), frotteurists, and zoophiliacs be protected for they are members of groups constituted by subjective feelings and often volitional sexual acts that are virtually always unchosen, powerful, and persistent.

But if we “protect” all groups constituted by subjective feelings and volitional acts, what happens not only to our religious liberty but also to our liberty to freely associate and assemble? What else do we base our diverse associations on other than feelings, beliefs, and volitional acts?

Though Huppke intended his Garcia interview to mock conservatives, what it really accomplishes is to reveal his own ignorance of what thoughtful Christians actually believe. It’s curious that “progressive” media pundits like Huppke rarely seem to find time to interview serious conservative theologians and legal scholars from academia who are writing on this topic. Many “progressives” have no idea who the conservative scholars are who are writing on topics related to homosexuality. Nor do they engage the serious ideas that inhere this discussion. The reasons for those intellectual failures are either ignorance or fear that their “arguments” don’t pass rational muster.

When “progressive” pundit Kirsten Powers recently outed herself as a born-again believer (whose theology needs some work), she made yet another astonishing revelation: Before her religious conversion at age 38, she did not know any Christians. As disciples of diversity and militants of multiculturalism, the social and intellectual insularity of so many “progressives” is both astonishing and ironic.

“Progressives” don’t really want to engage in a reasoned argument on this or any other topic related to sexual deviance. They don’t really want to debate in a serious way the ideas proposed by smart, well-educated dissenters. This in part explains why public high school teachers censor virtually all resources that espouse conservative views on the nature and morality of homosexuality (the other reason is arrogant self-righteousness). And so “progressives” leap nimbly over arguments with unctuous sophistic non-arguments and mockery. If they’re not simply mocking, they’re reaching into their cornucopia of fallacies. In Huppke’s short piece, we can find these fallacies: false analogy, straw man, and ad hominem (the fav of “progressives”).

The only funny part of Huppke’s lamentable article was his very last sentence in which he described his interview with Garcia as a “reasoned argument.”

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of Illinois Family Institute.

Albert Einstein once said, “Never do anything against conscience even if the state demands it.”

He was right.

In the aftermath of the Arizona religious freedom skirmish, I have a few questions for those who would presume to compel religious business owners, under penalty of law, to “provide goods and services” to homosexuals in a way that violates that business owner’s conscience.

To wit:

• Should a homosexual baker be forced to make a “God Hates Fags” cake for Westboro Baptist Church, simply because its members claim to be Christian?
• Should a black printer be forced to develop and print thousands of “White Power!” flyers for a skinhead rally just because the potential customer is white?
• Should a Christian florist be compelled to create and provide black floral arrangements to a hell-bound customer for her upcoming Satanist ritual?
• Should a “progressive,” environmentalist sign-maker be required to design and manufacture “Global Warming Is a Farce” signs for a tea party rally?
• Should a Muslim photographer, commissioned by San Francisco’s “Folsom Street Fair,” be forced to document that vile event – rife with nudity and public sex – simply because the customers identify as “gay”?
• Should a “gay married” lesbian hotel owner – a card-carrying member of GLAAD – be required, under threat of incarceration, to host and cater a fundraiser for the “National Organization for Marriage,” a group that opposes so-called “marriage equality”?

If you said no to any of the above, and you opposed Arizona’s cowardly vetoed SB1062, then you’re logically inconsistent and need to re-evaluate your position.

To clarify – liberals, I know you have a difficult time understanding the “Constitution” with its outdated “Bill of Rights” and all – I’m not talking about refusing business to someone just because he appears effeminate or she appears butch, or even when that someone is an “out and proud” homosexual.

I’ve never even heard of a case where a Christian baker randomly refused to provide baked goods – such as a birthday cake – to any homosexual, absent a scenario in which those goods endorsed a message the baker finds repugnant (rainbow “pride” cupcakes, “gay wedding” cakes and the like). I’ve never heard of a single instance in which a Christian business owner arbitrarily said to a homosexual: “We don’t serve your kind here.”

And neither can the left provide such an instance. Because it doesn’t happen. If it did happen, it would be front-page news for a month.

No, I’m specifically referring to scenarios that have occurred – and continue to occur – with alarming frequency. Situations in which Christian business owners are being sued, fined or even threatened with jail time for politely declining to apply their God-given time and talent to create goods or services that require they violate deeply held – and constitutionally protected – religious beliefs.

It really is that black and white. This was never about the person. It was always about the message. It was never about “discrimination.” It was always about liberty.

Freedom, man.

Because ‘Merica.

While from a constitutional standpoint it’s not even necessary, that’s all the drafters of SB1062 and similar such bills have endeavored to do. Because government has begun alienating unalienable rights at a level unparalleled since passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, legislators have attempted to merely re-affirm the already existing right for religious business owners to live out their faith without fear of persecution or government reprisal.

Seriously, unless you’re fascist, who could disagree? Nobody should ever be forced to spend their time and talent to endorse – whether directly or indirectly – a message or event that he or she finds repugnant. I don’t care if you’re Christian, pagan, black, white, “gay” or straight. That’s your God-given right as an American.

As a constitutionalist, I’ll remain consistent – will you? If you’re a homosexual photographer, for instance, and, for whatever reason, you oppose natural man-woman marriage, and you choose to exercise your right to only photograph “gay weddings,” then knock yourself out. If I come knocking and want you to photograph my wedding, and you tell me to pound sand, I’ll suck it up and take my business down the street.

And I won’t even demand you be thrown in jail for it.

See how easy that was? I mean, you’re a liberal. You’re “pro-choice,” right?

Starting to get it?

Well, let me be clear so there’s no misunderstanding. If I’m a business owner and someone comes in requesting goods or services that would require me to violate my conscience – especially my biblically-based, sincerely held religious beliefs – I will not, under any circumstances, provide those goods or services. This is my absolute, non-negotiable, constitutionally guaranteed right.

No debate. No question. No compromise.

Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “An individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for the law.”

Those are wise words from a wise man. For purposes of today’s debate, however, those words require a slight contextual modification. No “anti-discrimination” law that presumes to remove the constitutional right of business owners to operate their business according to conscience is worth the paper it’s written on.

Poo paper for puppy.

So, liberals, knock off the Alinskyite obfuscation and conflation. Quit throwing around all this “Jim Crow” crap. It belittles the legitimate civil rights struggle and makes you look stupid. You’ve created an ugly and offensive straw man and beat the stuffing out of him.

I rarely agree with “gay” activist Andrew Sullivan, but on the subject at hand, he at least has a remedial understanding. Gloss over all the obligatory “homophobe” and “bigot” nonsense, and he recently made a few good points on “The Dish”:

I favor maximal liberty in these cases. The idea that you should respond to a hurtful refusal to bake a wedding cake by suing the bakers is a real stretch to me. … There are plenty of non-homophobic bakers in Arizona. We run the risk of becoming just as intolerant as the anti-gay bigots [read: Christians], if we seek to coerce people into tolerance. If we value our freedom as gay people in living our lives the way we wish, we should defend that same freedom to sincere religious believers and also, yes, to bigots and haters. You do not conquer intolerance with intolerance. … I’m particularly horrified by the attempt to force anyone to do anything they really feel violates their conscience, sense of self, or even just comfort.

And besides, as constitutional law expert Jan LaRue recently observed in an email: “If they believe their own rhetoric, that we’re hateful bigots, why would they even risk eating our cakes?”

Why indeed?

Yuck.

Who’d a thunk it? Well-known homosexual writer and activist Andrew Sullivan responded to the Arizona debacle in a surprising blog post in which he makes two critical points rarely heard from the Left: First, he acknowledges that there is a difference between sincere religious belief and bigoted hatred. Second, he argues that compelling people to do something that violates their religious beliefs suppresses liberty and turns homosexuals into the intolerant bigots they routinely condemn. Here is an excerpt from that post:

As for the case for allowing fundamentalists to discriminate against anyone associated with what they regard as sin, I’m much more sympathetic. I favor maximal liberty in these cases. The idea that you should respond to a hurtful refusal to bake a wedding cake by suing the bakers is a real stretch to me.

Yes, they may simply be homophobic, rather than attached to a coherent religious worldview. But so what? There are plenty of non-homophobic bakers in Arizona. If we decide that our only response to discrimination is a lawsuit, we gays are ratcheting up a culture war we would do better to leave alone. We run the risk of becoming just as intolerant as the anti-gay bigots, if we seek to coerce people into tolerance. If we value our freedom as gay people in living our lives the way we wish, we should defend that same freedom to sincere religious believers and also, yes, to bigots and haters. You do not conquer intolerance with intolerance. As a gay Christian, I’m particularly horrified by the attempt to force anyone to do anything they really feel violates their conscience, sense of self, or even just comfort.

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Arizona Governor Jan Brewer vetoed the law that would have protected the right of people of faith to refuse to be part of homosexual faux-weddings. In so doing, she helped chisel out another chink in the constitutional wall that protects the free exercise of religion. Apparently, she does not possess the spine to withstand pressure from corporations and feckless politicians like John McCain and Mitt Romney who urged her to veto the bill.

Pastor and theologian Doug Wilson has this  to say about the Arizona debacle:

When [the Holy Spirit] is manifest, when the wind stirs, the church has the mojo. When it is not, then the GOP, and Romney, and the NFL, all feel safe in saying that Arizona should much rather provoke the evangelicals than provoke the gayboys.

Christians aren’t refusing to “serve gays and lesbians” as the media reports. Some Christians are refusing to use their labors in the service of a ceremony that God detests—as they should. These same Christians who don’t want to use their labors in the service of a ceremony that mocks marriage will serve and have served those who identify as homosexual. These faithful followers of Christ will sell baked goods and flowers to any particular individual including those who identify as homosexual. They won’t, however, use their gifts and labors in the service of a ceremony that mocks marriage and displeases the God they serve. This critical distinction is an inconvenient truth for “progressives.”

The Left persists in exploiting the stupid and dishonest comparison of homosexuality to race (or skin color) because it works. And it works in part because conservatives are too cowardly or lazy to challenge it every time a “progressive” trots it out, which is daily.

Skin color is 100% heritable, in all cases immutable, not constituted by subjective feelings, and carries no behavioral implications amenable to moral assessment.

Homosexuality, in contrast, is not 100 percent heritable, is in some cases mutable (or fluid as queer theorists describe it), and constituted centrally by subjective feelings and volitional sexual acts that are legitimate objects of moral assessment.

So, if the Left wants to construct a sound analogy, they need to find a suitable analogue like perhaps polyamory or consensual adult incest. Will the government at the behest of sexual transgressives one day require Christian bakers and florists to use their labors in the service of polyamorous or incestuous ceremonies, which are arguably less perverse than homosexual “weddings”?

Christians need to strengthen their rubbery spines and find their lost chests, which is difficult to do with the church’s anemic preaching. Doug Wilson paints a dark picture of what much of contemporary preaching portends:

When men preach boldly—as when they declare that sin is bad and Jesus is good—it is easy to represent them as having a go-to-hell dismissiveness about them. But it is actually the opposite. Those ministers who crawl on hands and knees in order to obtain the respect of the world—an odd way of proceeding, I should think—are those whose mealy-pulpitoons amount to a wish that the world would continue on its way to Hell, not warned, not rebuked, not hindered in any way. And those who try to stand across the way are accused of having engineered the way in the first place, and of harboring a not-so-secret wish that all non-Christians would tumble headlong into the Abyss.

If our preachers manage to hoist themselves off their hands and knees, here are some anchoring (and bracing) thoughts from Wilson to help them preach boldly:

As conservative Christians, we are accustomed to discuss homosexual issues in the light of Romans 1. There Paul tells us that our gay pride parades are the result of refusing to honor God as God, and refusing to give Him thanks. Nothing is plainer to exegetes—who are not selling out, or who don’t have a gun to their head—than the fact that an apostle of Jesus Christ taught us that for a man to burn with lust for another man was unnatural, and that for a woman to burn with lust for another woman was even more unnatural. But that is not the point I would like to make, although the point I need to make assumes this. We need to go on to see that this chapter teaches us something else quite important about our current controversies.

The wrath of God is described in this chapter, and it is described as God giving people over to their desires. The mercy of God is found in the restraints He places on us, and His wrath is revealed from heaven whenever He lets us run headlong, which is what is happening to us now. This wrath is described this same way again a couple verses later. God gave them up to dishonorable passions. It is repeated a third time just a moment later. God gave them up to a debased mind. When God lets go, that is His wrath. As Lewis says somewhere, Heaven is when we say to God “thy will be done.” Hell is when He says that to us.

So what consequences follow when He lets go? What does this wrath look like when it is visited on a culture?

The next point is often missed. This progression amounts to the wrath of God being revealed against us because we are being delivered up to the tender mercies of the wicked, which are cruel. Notice Paul’s description of what these people are like outside the bedroom. Right after his observations on men burning in lust for men, and women for women, he gives us an additional character description.

“And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful . . .” .

Now who do you want to put in charge of the new civility? Who do you want as an arbiter of true sensitivity in speech? Who should run the training seminars for all the big corporations on what “hate” is? Who should set the boundaries for acceptable public discourse? Who should be the appointed gatekeepers on what constitutes tolerant speech? For any Christian who has read Romans 1 rightly, not these people.

They don’t know what tolerance is. They don’t know how to spell it. They hate the very idea of it. They have taken the biblical doctrine of tolerance and have filed it into a shiv, so that they might smite us all under the fifth rib, as Joab did to people. This should not be surprising to us. Someone who finds the anus of another the object of his desire is not someone that I would trust to determine whether or not this sentence is a hate crime. They are liars and filled with all malice. They are backbiters, overflowing with malignity. They are implacable.

So if you want to form a brigade of tolerance cops, that is bad enough, but then, when you want to staff the whole brigade with these people, the entire spectacle turns into how the right panel of The Garden of Earthly Delights would look if Bosch had just taken three hits of acid just before painting it. The way of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes. The only thing that their lawlessness can really do well is breed more lawlessness . So I know! Let’s put them in charge of civility in public discourse.

This is the wrath of God upon us, and the wrath of God delivers us over to more than just our demented lusts. It delivers us over to the ministrations and judicial processes of those who refuse to tolerate any rebuke of their lusts, whether the rebuke is express or implied.

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Several states are now considering legislation that would provide explicit protections to citizens whose consciences will not allow an endorsement of same-sex marriage. The bills vary by state, as do the prospects for legislative passage, but the key issues remain constant. Millions of American citizens are facing a direct collision between their moral convictions and the demands of their government.

The cases are now piling up. A wedding photographer in New Mexico, cake bakers in Colorado and Oregon, and a florist in Washington State have all found themselves in this predicament. Each now faces the coercive power of the state. They are being told, in no uncertain terms, that they must participate in providing services for same-sex weddings or go out of business.

The bills now being considered in several states are attempts to protect these citizens from government coercion. They take the form of remedial legislation — bills intended to fix a problem. And the problem is all too real, and so is the controversy over these bills.

Those pushing for the legalization of same-sex marriage are relentless in their insistence that these bills would violate the civil rights of same-sex couples. They brilliantly employed arguments from the civil rights in their push for same-sex marriage, and they now employ similar arguments in their opposition to bills that would protect the consciences of those opposed to same-sex marriage. They claim that the rights of gays and lesbians and others in the LGBT community are equivalent to the rights rightly demanded by African Americans in the civil rights movement. Thus far, they have been stunningly successful in persuading courts to accept their argument.

That sets up the inevitable collision of law and values and Christian conviction. In each of the cases listed above, the key issue is not a willingness to serve same-sex couples, but the unwillingness to participate in a same-sex wedding. Christian automobile dealers can sell cars to persons of various sexual orientations and behaviors without violating conscience. The same is true for insurance agents and building contractors. But the cases of pressing concern have to do with forcing Christians to participate in same-sex weddings — and this is another matter altogether.

Photographers, makers of artistic wedding cakes, and florists are now told that they must participate in same-sex wedding ceremonies, and this is a direct violation of their religiously-based conviction that they should lend no active support of a same-sex wedding. Based upon their biblical convictions, they do not believe that a same-sex wedding can be legitimate in any Christian perspective and that their active participation can only be read as a forced endorsement of what they believe to be fundamentally wrong and sinful. They remember the words of the Apostle Paul when he indicted both those who commit sin and those “who give approval to those who practice them.” [Romans 1:32]

The advocates of same-sex marriage saw this coming, as did the opponents of this legal and moral revolution. Judges and legal scholars also knew the collision was coming. Judge Michael McConnell, formerly a judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit and now director of Stanford University’s Constitutional Law Center, suggested many years ago that the coming conflict would “feature a seemingly irreconcilable clash between those who believe that homosexual conduct is immoral and those who believe that it is a natural and morally unobjectionable manifestation of human sexuality.” Accordingly, he called for a spirit of tolerance and respect, much like what society expects of religious believers and atheists — what he called “civil toleration.”

But the advocates of same-sex marriage are not friendly to the idea of toleration. One prominent gay rights lawyer predicted just this kind of controversy almost a decade ago when she admitted that violations of conscience would be inevitable as same-sex marriage is legalized. Chai Feldblum, then a professor at the Yale Law School, also admitted that her acknowledgement of a violated conscience might be “cold comfort” to those whose consciences are violated.

But perhaps the strangest and most disappointing dimension of the current controversy is the entry of some Christians on the side of coercing the conscience. Writing in USA Today, Kirsten Powers accused Christians supporting such legislation of “essentially arguing for homosexual Jim Crow laws.” She explicitly denied that florists and bakers and photographers are forced to “celebrate” a same-sex union when forced to provide their services for such a ceremony.

Well, my wife and I recently celebrated the wedding of our daughter. We not only celebrated it, we paid for it. And I can assure you that we were expecting our florist and cake baker and photographer to celebrate it as well. And we employed them for their artistic ability and we paid for their expressive ideas. Kirsten Powers went on to suggest that Christians who have such scruples about same-sex weddings are hypocritical if they do not refuse to participate in the wedding of an adulterer. As a matter of fact, some Christian wedding vendors do indeed try to screen their clients in this way. But the fact remains that the marriage of a man and a woman is, in the biblical point of view, still valid. No union of same-sex couples is valid according to the Bible. This is a huge and consequential matter of conscience and conviction.

Jesus, we should note, was often found in the presence of sinners. He came, as he said, to save those who are lost. But there is not a shred of biblical evidence to suggest that Jesus endorsed sin in any way. To suggest otherwise is an offense to Scripture and to reason.

Just days later, Powers was joined by Jonathan Merritt in yet another essay in which they argued that conservative Christians are selectively applying the Scriptures in making their case. They also denied that forcing participation in a same-sex ceremony is a violation of conscience. They wrote:

“Many on the left and right can agree that nobody should be unnecessarily forced to violate their conscience. But in order to violate a Christian’s conscience, the government would have to force them to affirm something in which they don’t believe. This is why the first line of analysis here has to be whether society really believes that baking a wedding cake or arranging flowers or taking pictures (or providing any other service) is an affirmation. This case simply has not been made, nor can it be, because it defies logic.  If you lined up 100 married couples and asked them if their florist “affirmed” their wedding, they would be baffled by the question.”

Well, the issue is really not what “society really believes” about baking a wedding cake, but what the baker believes. Reference to what “society really believes” is a way of dismissing religious liberty altogether. If the defining legal or moral principle is what “society really believes,” all liberties are eventually at stake.

Their article also perpetuates another major error — that the wedding of a man and a woman under sinful circumstances is tantamount to the wedding of a same-sex couple. In their words, “This makes sure to put just one kind of ‘unbiblical’ marriage in a special category.” But a same-sex marriage is not “just one kind” of an unbiblical marriage — it is believed by conservative Christians to be no marriage at all.

The state might decide to recognize a same-sex union as a marriage, but to coerce a Christian to participate in a same-sex wedding is a gross violation of religious conscience.

And it will not stop with bakers and florists and photographers. What about singers and other musicians? Under the argument of Powers and Merritt, they can be forced to sing a message they believe to be abhorrent. What about writers for hire? This argument would force a Christian who writes for hire to write a message that would violate the deepest Christian convictions. To be forced to participate in an expressive way is to be forced to endorse and to celebrate.

The most lamentable aspect of the Powers and Merritt argument is the fact that they so quickly consign Christians to the coercive power of the state. They should be fully free to try their best to present a biblical argument that the right response of Christians is to offer such services. But to condemn brothers and sisters as hypocrites and to consign their consciences to the coercion of Caesar is tragic in every aspect. We can only hope that they will rethink their argument … and fast.

Chai R. Feldblum, “Moral Conflict and Conflicting Liberties,” in Same-Sex Marriage and Religious Liberty: Emerging Conflicts, ed. Douglas Laycock, Anthony R. Picarello, Jr., and Robin Fretwell Wilson (New York: Rowan and Littlefield, 2008). Quote from Judge Michael McConnell also found in this chapter.

Written by Tony Perkins, President of Family Research Council

Kim Dae Jin recalls the day when, as a prisoner in a North Korean labor camp, an informant betrayed a small group of prisoners who were Christian, which to be was forbidden.

“I watched as they (prison officials) grabbed hold of my friend’s arm so tightly that it died and had to be amputated,” he said. “After that, he and the other Christians were sent to an even stricter camp. You do not get out of a camp like that alive.”

Sadly, Kim’s tale is all too common in North Korea’s brutal regime. In its newly released annual report on Christian persecution, Open Doors notes that up to 70,000 Christians are being held in horrific conditions in the North Korean prison “gulag.” In them, everyone, from small children to the elderly, is subject to sub-human treatment, often for simply believing in Jesus.

One of the great tragedies of our time is that the situation in North Korea is by no means unique. Open Doors “works in the world’s most oppressive countries, strengthening Christians to stand strong in the face of persecution and equipping them to shine Christ’s light in these dark places.” Such places are far too common in the 21st Century.

In its annual “World Watch List,” Open Doors lists no less than 27 countries where persecution of Christians can be considered “extreme or severe.” These include such “mainstream” nations as Saudi Arabia and Egypt, as well as long-time religious liberty violators like Iran and Somalia.

Ministries like Open Doors, Voice of the Martyrs, China Aid and Christian Solidarity Worldwide do brave and vital work in helping persecuted believers, reminding us in free countries of the pain they face, and motivating international action on their behalf. Family Research Council (FRC) has worked and will continue to work with these organizations to educate and equip Christians in America to stand with the persecuted church and advocate on their behalf. 

Our persecuted brothers and sisters should continually be in our prayers. But praying is not enough. We need to be financially supporting these vital ministries that are helping persecuted and imprisoned Christians around the globe. We must also call upon our governmental leaders to advocate for those who are being persecuted for their faith.

Unfortunately, the Obama administration’s record on defending Christians persecuted for their faith has been embarrassingly weak. Under Mr. Obama’s watch, the State Department’s international religious freedom department has “missed some of the biggest crises of our day,” according to leading advocate for the persecuted Nina Shea.

Dr. Tom Farr was the first State Department international religious freedom director. Now at Georgetown University, Dr. Farr has spoken several times at FRC about the current administration’s ineptitude and indifference regarding those persecuted for their faith. His tentative judgment after nearly five years of the Obama administration? In his words, “The administration does not see international religious freedom as a priority.”

This international indifference to religious freedom should not surprise us when here at home we see hostility toward religious freedom from the Obama administration. As FRC has documented extensively, erosion of religious liberty in American public life and in our military are increasing.

This hostility to religious freedom has been evident in the president’s hallmark legislation, the Affordable Care Act (ACA). Under a provision of the ACA, Christian colleges and hospitals and Christian-run businesses would be required to provide their employees with health insurance plans that cover potential abortion-inducing drugs. This is a massive violation of their right to live out their faith in the marketplace, in the health care system, and in the academic world.

These policies flow from a truncated view of religious liberty. In his own words, President Obama has repeatedly expressed his support for the freedom of worship, not the freedom of religion. The freedom of worship is the ability to choose the church, if any; you want to attend on Sunday morning. The freedom of religion is the ability to live your life according to the religious teachings of your choice.

To be sure, American Christians experience nothing like the gruesome punishment Christians undergo daily around the globe. Yet the precursor to persecution is always repression, the forcing-down of Christian faith into quiet corners where its visibility is limited and its impact is weakened.

We are witnessing that kind of growing repression in the U.S. today and it is fostering or at least giving rise to the spread of the persecution of Christians and religious minorities around the world. Even as we stand with believers like Kim Dae Jin, we have to be vigilant in defending religious liberty where it’s always been most sacred – our own country.

On January 16, we will commemorate our annual “Religious Freedom Day.” Let’s hope, work, and pray that our “first freedom,” religious liberty, will not only remain our first freedom, but also become a freedom that people around the world will experience.

This article was originally posted at the ChristianPost.com.

A Colorado baker who declined to bake a cake for a same-gender “wedding” is fighting through an appeal to make sure his constitutionally protected freedoms – as well those of others – aren’t taken away.

In the summer of 2012, Charlie Craig and David Mullins filed a complaint with the Colorado Civil Rights Division after cake artist Jack Phillips of Masterpiece Cakeshop refused to endorse their marriage ceremony because of his faith. Last month the Colorado Administrative Law Court ruled Phillips must provide the cakes for homosexuals and prove that he has complied with the court order. Alliance Defending Freedom on Monday filed an appeal on Phillips’ behalf.

ADF-affiliated attorney Nicole Martin argues the government has “turn[ed] its guns” on her client for exercising his constitutional freedom.

“America was founded on the fundamental freedom of all citizens to live and work without fear of government punishment,” Martin offers. “Jack [Phillips] simply exercised the long-cherished freedom to not speak by declining to promote a false view of marriage through his creative work.

“It’s outrageous that the government would turn its guns on Jack and threaten him with a potential jail sentence unless he says and does what the government demands,” she adds.

In a statement to OneNewsNows, ADF attorney Kristen Waggoner says artists like Phillips “must be free to create work that expresses what he or she believes” without fear of the government compelling them to speak something contrary to their beliefs.

“Forcing Americans to promote ideas against their will undermines our constitutionally protected freedom of expression and our right to live free,” she says. “If the government can take away our First Amendment freedoms, there is nothing it can’t take away.”

 This article was orignially published at the OneNewsNow.com blog 

Written by Dennis Prager

The Left doesn’t recognize the liberties of those who oppose same-sex marriage. 

Jack Phillips owns the Masterpiece Cakeshop in Lakewood, Colo., about ten miles from downtown Denver. In July 2012, two gay men, Charlie Craig and David Mullins, asked Phillips to provide the cake for their wedding celebration. Though same-sex marriage is not allowed in Colorado — the Colorado constitution states that “only a union of one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in this state” — the two men had been married in Massachusetts.

As acknowledged by all parties, Phillips told the men, “I’ll make you birthday cakes, shower cakes, sell you cookies and brownies; I just don’t make cakes for same-sex weddings.”

Jack Phillips is an Evangelical Christian, and his religion does not allow him to participate in same-sex marriages or celebrations of same-sex marriages.

In other words, Phillips made it clear from the outset that he does not discriminate based on the sexual orientation of a prospective customer. He will knowingly sell his products to any gay person who wishes to purchase his baked goods.

Nevertheless, Craig and Mullins went to the ACLU, which then sued Phillips. On December 6, administrative law judge Robert N. Spencer handed down his decision: “The undisputed facts show that Respondents [Masterpiece Cakeshop] discriminated against Complainants [Craig and Mullins] because of their sexual orientation by refusing to sell them a wedding cake for their same-sex marriage, in violation of § 24-34-601(2), C.R.S.”

The section of the C.R.S. (Colorado Revised Statutes) cited by Judge Spencer reads:

It is a discriminatory practice and unlawful for a person, directly or indirectly, to refuse, withhold from, or deny to an individual or a group, because of . . . sexual orientation . . . the full and equal enjoyment of the goods, services, facilities, privileges, advantages, or accommodations of a place of public accommodation.

Thus, under penalty of fines and, potentially, jail:

1. Jack Phillips must participate in an event that the Colorado constitution explicitly prohibits.

2. He must do so against deeply held religious convictions.

3. He must do so despite the fact that there are hundreds of other cake makers in the Denver area.

Those who support this decision argue that religious principles do not apply here — what if, for example, someone’s religious principles prohibited interracial marriages? Should that individual be allowed to deny services to an interracial wedding? Of course not. Here’s why that objection is irrelevant:

1. No religion practiced in America — indeed, no world religion — has ever banned interracial marriage. That some American Christians opposed interracial marriage is of no consequence. No one assumes that every position held by any member of a religion is the position of that religion.

2. If opposition to same-sex marriage is not a legitimately held religious conviction, there is no such thing as a legitimately held religious position. Unlike opposition to interracial marriage, opposition to same-sex marriage has been the position of every religion in recorded history — as well as of every country and every American state in history until the 21st century.

3. The Colorado baker made it clear to the gay couple — as acknowledged by the court — that he would be happy to bake and sell cakes to these gay men any other time they wanted. Therefore, he is not discriminating against people based on their sexual orientation. He readily sells to people he knows to be gay. What he is unwilling to do is to participate in an event that he opposes for entirely legitimate religious reasons. Until at the most ten years ago, no one would have imagined that a person could be forced to provide goods or services for a same-sex wedding.

4. If a baker refused on religious grounds to provide the wedding cake for a polygamous wedding, should the state force him to do so? If a baker refused to provide a cake to a heterosexual couple that was celebrating living together without getting married, should the state force him to?

Some years ago, Jonah Goldberg wrote a bestseller titled Liberal Fascism. If you think that title is an exaggeration, read the book. Or just watch what liberals are doing to those who oppose same-sex marriage.

In the name of tolerance, the Left is eroding liberty in America.

Dennis Prager is a nationally syndicated radio talk-show host and columnist. His most recent book is Still the Best Hope: Why the World Needs American Values to Triumph. He is the founder of Prager University and may be contacted at dennisprager.com.

This article was originally published at the NationalReview.com blog.

Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys filed a federal lawsuit Tuesday against the Obama administration on behalf of Dr. James Dobson and his “Family Talk” radio show and ministry, a Christian non-profit organization that is currently subject to Obamacare’s abortion pill mandate.

The lawsuit challenges the legality and constitutionality of the mandate, which requires religious employers to provide insurance coverage for abortifacients, sterilization, and contraception to employees regardless of religious or moral objections. Dobson and Family Talk object specifically to providing coverage for abortion drugs and devices.

“The government shouldn’t be able to punish Americans for exercising their fundamental freedoms,” said Senior Legal Counsel Matt Bowman. “Any government willing to force a family-run Christian ministry to participate in immoral acts under the threat of crippling fines is a government everyone should fear.”

“Our ministry believes in living out the religious convictions we hold to and talk about on the air,” added Dobson, Family Talk’s founder and president. “As Americans, we should all be free to live according to our faith and to honor God in our work. The Constitution protects that freedom so that the government cannot force anyone to act against his or her sincerely held religious beliefs. But the mandate ignores that and leaves us with a choice no American should have to make: comply and abandon your religious freedom, or resist and be fined for your faith.”

The lawsuit, Dobson v. Sebelius, filed with the U.S. District Court for the District of Colorado, argues that the mandate violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act as well as the First and Fifth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution.

Alliance Defending Freedom attorneys and allied attorneys are also litigating numerous other lawsuits against the mandate. The lawsuits represent a large cross-section of Protestants and Catholics who object to the mandate.

Alliance Defending Freedom is an alliance-building, non-profit legal organization that advocates for the right of people to freely live out their faith.

Christmas is the most notable day on the calendar where the general American public is reminded of the life of Jesus Christ. That is why some want to do away with it.

Someone sent me an article from USA Today, which has this headline: “Not all Christians believe there is a ‘War on Christmas.'” The article quotes Christian leaders and authors saying they disagree with those of us who believe there is a war on Christmas. I could give a litany of examples of exactly how the war on Christmas has manifested itself the last decade or so. From nativity scenes no longer being allowed on the courthouse square, to schools changing Christmas break to “winter” break, from Christmas parades being changed to “winter” parades, to children being told they can no longer sing carols during their “winter” program, etc., etc. There is an intentional effort by some secularists to purge the word ‘Christmas’ from our culture. Whether it will be successful or not remains to be seen. But it’s discouraging to see some fellow Christians say – “Who cares?”

The very word itself – “Christmas” – is a reminder that this particular holiday is the celebration of Jesus Christ. Those who promote political correctness and extreme multiculturalism resent this because it is exclusionary in their view. Some Christians are willing to go along with that line of thinking. For example, USA Today quoted Dan Scott, senior pastor of Christ Church in Nashville, who said this: “We really need a way to treat the public square as the public square and private realms as private realms and not feel demonized because we come from a different perspective.” In other words, Christians should keep Christmas in our homes and churches – the “private realms” – but we can’t expect the general public to be accepting of Christmas any longer because it promotes Christianity.

Christmas is the exaltation of one particular religion that makes a claim of being the only true religion and that is unacceptable to the movers and shakers of contemporary American popular culture, elitist academia, and many in the mainstream media, news, and entertainment. Therefore, Christmas must be replaced with words and ideas that are broad and general so as to knock Christmas from its traditional place in America’s public life. It is an attempt to define Christianity as no more important to the history and fabric of America than is, say, Hinduism. This is what these people (often called secular progressives) believe, and evidently a number of Christians agree with that position. Subsequently these Christians find more fault with their fellow believers – those of us who want to keep Christ in Christmas and Christmas in America – than they do with those who want to eradicate Christmas.

This is why it concerns me when I read stories like the one in USA Today. One of the people quoted in the article is Christian author Rachel Held Evans, best known for her book, A Year of Biblical Womanhood. Evans wrote a blog that went viral where she challenges the idea of a war on Christmas with these questions: “Did someone threaten your life, safety, civil liberties or right to worship?” No. “Did someone wish you happy holidays?” Yes. “You are not being persecuted.”

What Evans has done here is very clever. She framed the issue falsely. She set up a straw man. No one is arguing that Christians are being persecuted physically. What we are saying is Christianity itself is under siege in America. Just ask the Christian bakery owners in Washington state, the Christian florist in Colorado, or the Christian photographer in New Mexico who were all fined by their state governments because they would not participate in homosexual “weddings.” But what Evans has done is like the man who cheats on his wife and she confronts him about it. It might go something like this:

“I know you are cheating on me. What do you have to say for yourself?” the wife says. To which the husband responds: “There are children dying in sweatshops in Third World countries, and you are talking to me about my having sex a couple of times with some woman? Are you serious?”

See how this works? The “logic” is: If your life is not being threatened or your family is not in physical danger or your church is not being padlocked, then we have no cause to point out the war of Christmas. It’s much ado about nothing, say these Christian brothers.

The war on Christmas is really part of the larger war on Christianity and it concerns me that smart people like Rev. Scott and Evans don’t seem to get that.

Then there was the quote from Daniel Darling, vice president of communications for the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission. The article said this about his position: “He (Darling) said on Friday that some media outlets are overstating the war on Christmas debate, and very few Christians actually engage in it. ‘We advise people that, rather than trying to force that weary Wal-Mart worker to say ‘Merry Christmas’ against company policy, how about we be the bearers of joy. Instead of taking offense, say, ‘Here’s the story, we’re the joyful ones. We’re the ones that have the greatest story.'”

Darling, like Evans, has created a false caricature of his fellow Christians who want to keep Christmas alive in the public square. The image Darling creates is one of a Christian bully. Who does this browbeating of store employees? No one I know. (By the way, Wal-Mart does not forbid its employees from wishing customers a “Merry Christmas.”) What American Family Association and some other groups do is produce a Naughty & Nice list of companies that do or don’t allow Christmas in their stores. Due to the efforts of AFA, many household name corporations have put Christmas back in their promotions, advertisements, and stores over the last few years. The Gap was the latest store to write AFA about how they were doing this. This is a good thing. Christians should applaud Gap and others when they refuse to yield to political correctness and recognize that if not for the Christmas gift-buying season, many of them would not be in business.

All of this Christians criticizing other Christians, often based on false information as demonstrated here, seems to be a trend. I’m not sure why this is, but I have a couple of theories. First, we Bible-believing Christians have been so maligned and lied about by the media, particularly the entertainment and news media, that the negative stereotype that has been created has stuck. And now even we are quick to believe the worst about our fellow brothers and sisters. The second reason is what I call the “nicer than Jesus” mentality. It is human nature to want to be liked and avoid confrontation. Christian activism, while it should always be carried out with civility and manners, is sometimes by necessity confrontational – and confrontation is not considered “nice” by some. But Jesus himself said in Matthew 5:10: “Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” Jesus is talking here about a public stand for biblical righteousness, not just being a Christian. The world doesn’t care if you are Christian … as long as you don’t talk about what’s right and wrong, moral and immoral, or good and evil. That’s when the persecution comes.

Is there a war on Christmas? Yes. Is it part of a larger war on Christianity? Yes. Does this matter to the future of our country? Most certainly.

Just because Christians are not being physically persecuted in America today doesn’t mean these matters are not important. Not only is Christianity good for the individual, the moral value system that comes from Christianity is also good for society at large. God help us get it back before it’s too late.

This article first appeared at the American Family Association blog.